Three quick points.
1. The unfair dismissal law does not more than require what any decent employer would do anyway. Complaints about it reflect badly on the whinger.

2. Education systems should not be forced to adopt economic benefits as their primary aim, and even less add their sole aim.

3. What counts as quality education depends on what the aims are, and their order of priority. The treatment of numeracy and literacy in the Government's tests threatens to distort secondary education. (Only by stretching the concept of literacy does it even look plausible.)

4. It was plain when work choices was in play that too many employers can not be trusted with extra power.

Andrew Lee

Kindly tell us what you mean with ‘Productivity’ and do not mention the Eslake(s) or this world.

There are too many of them and they do not seem to have reached any consensus on the definition of the word 'Economy' let alone that of 'Productivity'.

I, the payer of your and Eslake's salaries, need to understand what you are talking about.

"It was plain when work choices was in play that too many employers can not be trusted with extra power". I agree ozbib.

And in recent news, the business lobby groups are again pushing for greater flexibility (busi-speak for reductions in wages and working conditions), to complement their already un-abated, un-trameled margins of profit.

Privatisation of public assets , infrastructure and essential services utilities, have ensured that Australian taxpayers do not get value for their money.

In an Australia where Rupert Murdoch owns 70% of the media and has the temerity to accuse the ABC, (one of our last remaining publicly owned instruments), of being "anti-competitive" in an international media tendering process. (Thats Rupert-speak for not getting his own way and having control of information both coming in and going out of Australia), for a song, we find that even the thought process we are allowed to indulge in, is controlled today, with big business moulding or dominating the landscape, making it fashionable to think one way or another.

No your right ozbib.

There is no Messiah , only sycophants and servants of the powers that be. A great example is the Gillard compromise mining tax that excludes gold. Gold has gone up recently from $400 ish an ounce to $1800 an ounce , and we are not getting a bit of that extra super profit, and it's our Gold. At the same time the media are not reporting this.

A mess indeed , and a mess created by mis-information, power hungry oppositions in league with corporations, loaded opinion polls asking the wrong questions, empirical media barons and other vested interest from the big end on town, not paying their fair share of the burden and with the leash already off.

The O'Farrell NSW State Gov't has shown the colours of the right wing sycophants, by invoking tens of thousands of public servants from nurse educator's, fireman police to demonstrate and strike today in a pledge of mass solidarity, against such maniacal nonsense as proposed by the O'Farrell Gov't.

Flexing his pea brain for mine. Shades of Abbott in power.

Well put thinker 2 and ozbib.

WorkChoices revealed that when more power is given to the employers they will generally revert to lowest common denominator behaviour. Not all employers but enough of them to make a huge impact. It is just a fact of life. Even law firms were advertising "how to be a bigger b*stard than the rest" contract services. Everyone was cashing in except the workers.

Senior Executives at that time were enjoying pay rises of anywhere between 20-60% despite falls in share prices and profit declines.

It beggars belief for big business to raises the ugly head of WorkChoices once again while Boards continue to approve huge rises in salaries for the senior executives.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-09-02/telstra-executives-get-pay-rise/2868108

http://www.npr.org/2011/07/03/137594401/ceo-salaries-continues-to-rise